


Words: Attenuation

by bekeleven



Series: Words that we Couldn't Say [4]
Category: RWBY
Genre: Drama, Gen, Speech Disorders
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-26
Updated: 2016-05-05
Packaged: 2018-05-29 06:43:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 18,303
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6363589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bekeleven/pseuds/bekeleven
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Neither enemies nor allies are all they seem when Neopolitan finds herself caught between powerful forces.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Let's Go

Neo waited.

One day until the doctor said she could walk. After previous experiments, she was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. Fine. No walking today. She would sit in her bed like a good little girl and wait for the clock to tick. Read on her new scroll. Neo waited for her body.

Neo waited.

The sound was muted, but she still watched the news on the wall screen. Once or twice a minute, her gaze tracked across the ticker at the bottom, waiting for the notice that visitors from Vale were found dead. There were any plenty of other headlines that could catch her eye, too, like ones about the Nikos. If they went public, there went Nubu's contacts. Neo waited for tragedy.

Neo waited.

Neo was wanted in Mistral twice over. Both as Neopolitan and as Mari, from before. Mari, funny enough, was sought on a child welfare case _and_ as a person of interest regarding the disappearance of her family. The rest of her family. Mari had already been disappeared for a while. The nurses called her Polly, but how long could that last? So Neo waited for the law.

Neo waited.

She wasn't hard to find. Sure, there were close to a hundred hospitals and clinics in Mistral, but Mistral General North was the second largest, and Polly was a known alias. Maybe not yet known to Mistral law enforcement, but known to Blake Belladonna. And certainly known to Cinder Fall, and whatever faction of the white fang she still controlled. Maybe Ruby checked her in under the Mistral domestic abuse anonymity laws, but it seemed unlikely that she'd know them in the first place, or that such protections would hinder large criminal organizations. Maybe Cinder just didn't care enough. Neo waited to die.

She sighed and closed _The Kingdom of Mistral: Geography and Landmarks._ Somehow, geography always bored her. Few things could lose Neo's interest as quickly as fiction, but this book managed.

Back to research? She'd spent two days looking for the Salem Emerald had mentioned. Or at least, that Neo thought she mentioned. For all their popular appeal, flashbulb memories weren't especially reliable, and Neo had been in the process of bleeding out while Emerald had spoken. Maybe the days spent sleeping let her brain record the memory better, but that sounded farfetched.

All she'd found were fairy tales. Salem, the magician. Salem, burning the cruel children. Salem, half grimm. It was obvious Emerald had cracked, but Neo hadn't comprehended the level of nonsense inside her brain until she found herself perusing fairy tales in a desperate search for answers.

There was as little to go on as there was to do. Stuck in bed, clueless. Tomorrow she was supposed to start PT. If she was well enough to use a walker, she was well enough to leave. She was useless just waiting around.

But where to go?

Neo had alienated Cinder, and likely other organized crime outfits in the city. One or two might still hire her on, if word hadn't spread. Some others would want to if word _had_. But if somebody views your defection as a merit, it means they place little stock in loyalty. Again it came down to whether Cinder cared enough to end Neo's life, but in this case, the end was more indirect. And it wasn't even something Neo could blame on her. Neo invited it when she threw away her old life for Ruby Rose, the impossibly kind friend that abandoned her.

Neo was not an impulsive person. She hadn't been in the past, anyway. She'd started at the bottom, and worked her way up piece by piece. Certainly she'd had help. Roman, for one.

Where was Roman now? What would he say, if she found him, and offered bare skin? The touch he'd been denied in the past. Giving him the knowledge, the feeling, of why she'd done it. Why she'd felt it was right. Laying her soul bare. Would he take her back?

The doctors hadn't made a big deal about her hand. It was all she could hope for. It seemed to ache more now, maybe because her aura was busy elsewhere.

No. It was because she couldn't distract herself any more. Aches and pains didn't matter as long as Neo could keep moving forward. Stuck in her bed alone, she had nothing else to focus on. Pain in her chest or pain on her hand. And always, always, pain in her head, behind her eyes.

She could reinvent herself. The first time had been Roman's doing, but she got the idea of how it worked. Polly was a burnt identity, at least once Mistral caught up with Vale about Cinder and her team, but Lita could work. Better still would be to start fresh. Exchange her umbrella for a bat or something, and call herself Iris.

And what would she say, or type, when people asked about the other young short mute criminal enforcer?

The more Neo thought about it, the more she hated the only path left to her. But there were no alternatives. Word would spread to other kingdoms in time.

Should she be _happy_ that she memorized Blake's number?


	2. Talk to the Wind

Ren's watch. He sat on a log and stared out at the forest, motionless. He could've been in a tree, but it's not like the tents would hide themselves too.

Jaune hobbled over to him and sat down. His foot was just sore. And not even that sore. It was healthy enough that he didn't hobble all the time. Specifically when Qrow was watching. Jaune had a lot of practice being the picture of health.

"Do you mind if I join you?"

"I do not." It was Jaune's watch in a five minutes anyway.

"How are you doing, Ren?"

"Fine." Ren's gaze never wavered. His head moved back and forth as he scanned the treeline. Every minute, his scroll buzzed, and he turned around to check the field behind them. Jaune wasn't nearly so careful on his shifts.

"Not in much of a... talking mood, I take it?"

"No." Typical Ren. Maybe even more so. He'd barely said twenty words in the past two weeks. Just walked, and stood, and sat, and slept with a mask of indifference on his face.

"Well, do you mind if I talk then? I won't be too loud."

"No." Scroll vibration. Turn around. See nothing. Turn back.

"I've been thinking about Pyrrha."

Ren didn't react. _Why am I waiting for him to interrupt me?_

"Right, I'll just talk. I've been thinking about Pyrrha. Maybe it's having her miniature clone sister person around, but I can't get her out of my head. The night she... the night she died. Just keeps going through my head, over and over again."

Ren finished scanning to the right, and began to turn his head left again.

"We were running from the tower. I was scrambling around my scroll for numbers. When she stopped, when she looked back and we saw the red reflecting through the building, we both knew what happened. And I think I understood instantly what was about to happen. I didn't want to admit it to myself, Ren. But I knew what Pyrrha was going to do.

"It was the look in her eyes. Well, that confirmed it, I guess. Really I knew what she would do because of who she was. Pyrrha Nikos, the..." Jaune took a ragged breath. "The invincible girl."

Scroll vibration. Turn around. See nothing. Turn back.

"She knew Cinder was going to destroy it. And that she would kill. She knew Cinder would destroy everything we loved. And all she ever was knew that it was her destiny to stop it." He forced the words out. "So she did."

Jaune stopped staring at Ren's face to turn around. Just looked like a field. He didn't understand why it would hold new interest every minute, but such were the joys of guard duty.

"The thing is, when I go over that night, I can't just remember what Pyrrha did. It's never that simple. The entire night is just a series of bad decisions. Not Pyrrha's, but mine. At every step, I failed. It's..."

Jaune had to get it out. It wasn't about himself. "The fall maiden died because I didn't stand and watch for Cinder. And I'm not saying you have to stay up until morning, by the way, I'm just saying that night I failed. Then Ozpin tells Pyrrha to leave, because she has to get me to safety. And I'm trying to call Glynda, but I can't find her number, so nobody was there in time to help. It all circles back to me, Ren. From every angle, I'm the reason things didn't work. Every step, I failed her."

Scroll vibration. Jaune turned around with Ren, scanned the field, and turned back. Ren to the treeline, Jaune to Ren.

"Pyrrha knew it, too. That despite all the time she spent on me, I was never even average. Maybe thirtieth percentile across all academies. Then she wasted more time and effort sending me away. And it wasn't easy for her. I mean, it was, I just got through saying I'm weak. But emotionally it wasn't easy for her. It might have prevented her from concentrating on her fight. It might have made her hesitate at a critical moment. From top to bottom, Ren, it was all me."

"Jaune Arc." Ren turned to him. "Pyrrha was a smart, capable woman who made a reasoned decision to risk her life for the safety of those she loved and believed in. It isn't right for you to claim her agency for yourself."

Jaune gave Ren a warm smile. Then he pulled Ren's arm in close, grasped hands, and shook.

"Tag. You're it."

Ren looked down at their hands, up at Jaune's face, and his mask slipped. Jaune saw the fear and the pain, just for a second, before they were covered up with a furrowed brow and slight frown.

At least it wasn't indifference.

Ren's scroll buzzed. He stood up stalk straight. "Please begin two minutes early." Without waiting for a response, he hurried over to their joint tent and slipped inside.

Maybe it would help the man. Maybe it wouldn't. All Jaune could do was guess what was going through that green and pink head of his. But smart money was on guilt.

Jaune had some experience with that. And if speaking meant that Ren would have less experience, he would talk until he was blue in the face.


	3. Ask Yourself

"Shell. Come inside."

Sylvia walked into the office of Belle, real name Blake Belladonna, and closed the door behind her. Quite by accident, she'd ended up in the girl's, no, the woman's confidence. Blake thought of herself as a woman. That should settle the matter.

"Thank you, Shell." Blake massaged her head, still worried that her identification of her second-in-commands through faunus features threatened to objectify or animalize them, but more scared still of learning their names and connecting with them on a personal level. Sylvia wanted to let Blake know that she didn't have much to worry about with her, but it might be awkward to bring up. "Sit down."

"What is it, Belle?" Asked Sylvia, taking the free chair.

"The white fang is in a curious position right now," began Blake, letting Sylvia see how it ended. It was mostly stuff she'd known before. Lack of funds, lack of trust, hopelessly large obstacles, a smattering of half-formed exit strategies. That was where Sylvia featured. Sylvia had never been in Blake's exit strategies before.

"You've been strong, resourceful, and loyal to me these past weeks." Sylvia had been Blake's second for 13 days, actually, but to Blake that was two days from a record. "I want you to know the situation that we're in. I'm out of meaningful factions to absorb and loot. Mistral is mine. That means I have about eleven days of Lien before I'm ousted and the white fang goes... feral."

Sylvia affected surprise.

"Let me lay out the options." Drugs, intimidation, lashing, flight, betrayal. "I can dip a paw into a criminal sector, perhaps drugs, we have somewhat of a captive audience by now and I've caught a few subordinates trading even without my permission. That would let us limp on with core functionality intact. I can tell people we're cutting wages, live with it or don't. I can attack human criminal organizations in the city. I can run and let my successor figure it out. Or, I can turn in the white fang in exchange for a deal and be rid of the whole mess. Each approach has problems."

"Mistral military is too corrupt to trust," volunteered Sylvia. "Turning the white fang to them would end in a reverse-sting and get you killed. And the police aren't equipped for a war with us. If you declare war on the human underground you'll have a bloodbath, win or lose. If you try to keep the white fang together with no capital, the white fang will splinter again and even your underlings would hate you. You'd be using force and fear to keep faunus in line, which you don't want to do."

"And if you run, your successor would either go back to crime, or be me. And I'll be facing the same problems you've got right now. Looks to me like you need to sell some drugs."

Blake shook her head. "That's exactly what I've been thinking," she admitted. "I guess I just needed to hear somebody else say it. Thank you, Shell. I mean it. I haven't had a chance to genuinely talk to about this stuff."

Which Blake needed, since she wasn't a natural leader. The woman leaned back in her chair and stared at her ceiling light. "I'm not a leader, Shell. I'm just not cut out for this stuff. I don't know how Adam did it. Love him or hate him, and believe me I've done both... he outmatched me in a lot of ways." Blake was thinking again about asking Sylvia's name, but decided it was too late. "You're with me for the haul, right, Shell?"

Sylvia hadn't meant to end up in such a high-profile position, but now that she was here there was nothing for it. If she said no, and left the woman without support, Blake might just run and leave her to lead the white fang by herself. "I'm with you, Belle." Damn her predecessors for dying so easily. Oh well. Sylvia could always leave herself if Cinder got too close. Maybe fake her death, Blake wouldn't look twice. The woman was surprised Sylvia had lasted _this_ long.

"Good. There's somebody I need you to meet." At first all Sylvia could see was the killer of Adam, an association with such a bounty of emotions it crowded everything else out. She squinted until it resolved into finer details. A woman, around Blake's age. Friend of a friend, or more. Strong. Fast. Mute. Untrustworthy.

Blake pressed a button on her scroll, and behind Sylvia, the door was opened. She knew who it was, but Blake was watching her, so she turned around.

Neopolitan, well under Sylvia's five foot four. Neopolitan, pink and brown eyes under multihued hair. Neopolitan, an umbrella on her belt, nearly scraping the ground.

Neopolitan, bandaged and weak. Once named Mari Jani. A remorseless murderer who's killed for good reasons, for bad reasons, and for no reason at all. A confluence of trauma and pain. Too damaged to understand friendship or kindness. Backed up against a wall, with nowhere to go.

And above all other words and thoughts and ideas, a girl named Ruby Rose, and desire.

Sylvia found Neopolitan unsettling.

"This is Neo," said Blake. "She killed Adam. She was injured protecting me last month from the ambush by Cinder's hit squad and the rogue white fang. I owe her my life." But she didn't trust her, not even a little. And Neopolitan didn't seem to trust anybody.

But neither one planned to betray the other, not in any meaningful way. Blake might tell Neopolitan that she was in contact with Ruby Rose, or Neopolitan might imply that she attacked Adam while the man was awake, but neither had genuine ill will. Only a willingness to overstate their claims in pursuit of mutual understanding. They _wanted_ to trust, but each hedged their bets, assuming the other to be doing the same thing.

Sylvia could barely remember before that night in the hospital, with the soldier and Mr. Ozpin, but she didn't need to wonder what life was like for normal people. She could see it every time she opened her eyes.

"Neo, tell Shell why you're here."

Neo wrote her message on a scroll, which Sylvia was obliged to read. ɪ ᴡɪʟʟ ʜᴇʟᴘ ɪɴ ᴀɴʏ ᴡᴀʏ ɪ ᴄᴀɴ. Then she typed some more, and Blake narrowed her eyes. ᴀs ʟᴏɴɢ ᴀs ɪ ᴛʜɪɴᴋ ʏᴏᴜʀ ᴀᴄᴛɪᴏɴs ᴀʀᴇ ʜᴇʟᴘɪɴɢ ʜᴇʀ.


	4. Run

The others were all examining the town, but Nubu kept her eyes on Master Ren. The rest had lost a classmate. He had lost something much more.

It must be hard for him.

The inn was where Mr. Branwen had told them, but it wouldn't have been easy to miss in any case. The town only had a single street of note, with another on either side, and some scattered buildings past where the streets ended. Besides the main street, they were just paths. Big things would usually be flown this far north.

Master Ren's eyes tracked across the snow left in the street. Only the walks, right next to the buildings, were cleared. His face showed nothing. This was what saving the world meant. Would he follow Ms. Nora? The reunion, now overdue? Those paths would be gone in an hour, buried.

Lights were off in the town, except for the inn and a few upstairs windows. Jaune led the way. He opened the door to a vestibule barely large enough for himself, passed through once the outer door closed, then motioned for the others to follow.

They entered into a cozy, slightly chilly room with a few low tables and some ash in the fireplace, lit by electric lights and chilled by heating vents in the ceiling. Judging by the lack of wind, the fireplace flue was shut. Master Arc was peeking through a doorway, looking for someone in charge. Nubu and Ms. Rose followed Master Arc's lead and threw off their cloak's hoods. One table was occupied, by a big woman and two bigger men dressed in furs whispering back and forth, casting the occasional glances towards the Nubu and the other students. They had an assortment of weapons next to their seats. Bladed. Weapons for generalists. Nubu used a pointed weapon, good for grimm.

Master Arc found the innkeeper. Nobody in a town like this could survive only on guests. He had a second job of some sort. The man was solid and strong, in his early thirties, and bundled up despite the room's relative warmth. Just got back inside through a back door, maybe.

"I've only one room," the man was saying.

"Great. We'll take it," said Master Arc. "It's just so miserable out, we need to stay indoors for a night." Saying more than he needed to.

"Forty Lien for the night," the man said.

"Eesh," answered Master Arc. _Don't attract attention._ "Ren, money?"

Master Ren was starting at the wall behind the huntsmen.

"Ren, money?" Master Arc tapped his shoulder.

Master Ren turned to him, stuck a hand into a pocket, and emerged with four cards. He handed them off, never removing his eyes from the wall. There was a corkboard there, with a dozen papers pinned.

Nubu walked past the huntsmen to the board. Bounties. One she even recognized: Tallwych Afon. 50,000 Lien for a live capture. Odd that they'd posted a bounty of him in such a remote area, white fang leaders weren't the run away and live in the wilderness type. Had the authorities figured out he was dead, or had Mr. Branwen not left enough remains to identify? Was the innkeeper in charge of removing inactive bounties?

No, wait, she recognized a second. Nubukha Nikos. 10,000 Lien for return unharmed. The printing was grainy, but her face was clear, as was her armor.

Father was angry.

Nubu walked back over to Miss Rose, studying the other walls. Fishing through her pockets, Nubu found a paperclip. "Please put this tight around that switch over there," she murmured, nodding her head to her left. The huntsmen still cast the occasional glance their way, but they hadn't ever stopped whispering, nor had their whispers seemed to grow in urgency.

Miss Rose took a few steps closer as though examining one of the amateurish paintings on the wall, then leaked a few rose petals. The clip vanished from her hands.

"I'll show you to your room, then." The innkeeper walked into the hall. The rest followed him.

Nubu neared Miss Rose. "Thank you, Miss Rose. I'll be a moment." Nubu stayed in the doorway, hand on the hallway lightswitch, and waited for the others to reach the stairs. She stared at the board. Perfect aim was a necessity.

Nubu yanked the paper clip around the lightswitch, pulling it down while she flipped the hall switch, leaving the floor almost entirely in the dark. Then she pulled on the four tacks holding her picture on the board evenly, but one must have been stuck than the rest, because Nubu heard paper tear. She pulled from the top of her head so that the angle would counteract gravity and relaxed her pull strength when she felt the resistance lessen, so that she wouldn't pull the other papers in the arc she was sweeping.

Nubu was hit in the chest with a small ball of paper and metal, which she caught. Then another tack hit her in the head. Must have been loose. It fell to the ground with a quiet clink.

She stepped out of the doorway and into the hall. Then she pushed up from her foot at the lightswitch in the room while turning the hall lights back on with her free hand.

Both went on three seconds after they'd gone off. The huntsmen started murmuring about what had happened. A flicker? Electricity wasn't always so reliable out in towns like this. They talked over the paper clip hitting the ground from Nubu's push popping it up off the switch. No need to look more closely at the postings. No need to wonder about a girl grabbing a posting. It was the best she could do.

Nubu unwrapped the paper as she ascended the stairs. Three tacks and three corners. The missing corner could be a problem. She had the picture and the details, but the top of her sheet only identified her as Nubukha N before the tear.

The innkeeper was showing the group the room on the left of the upstairs hallway. It would be cramped even without Mr. Branwen, off checking on something. Even without Miss Neopolitan. Nubu walked in behind them.

Nobody paid her any mind, save a glance from Master Ren.


	5. Hate to Say I Told You So

Cinder was so much better with technology. Neo hated the fiddling. Compared to how much time she spent on her scroll, she didn't know very much about how computers worked. Only what she read.

She knew people, at least to some extent. She'd read about where they kept passwords. But General Jet seemed to buck the stereotype, because Neo couldn't find his anywhere. At least she had time.

Neo - Lita, for now - took a short break from poking around his computer desk to explore the rest of the home office. It was slow going, with the security cameras everywhere. Another advantage to working for Cinder. And to being allowed to break what you needed, from cameras to those watching them.

Neo was doing things the _right_ way.

Hopefully whoever was watching the feeds, if anybody, wasn't checking that individual books remained on the shelves frame to frame. She found notes on proposed base layouts and restructured benefit plans, which she dutifully photographed. One book just had columns of numbers, probably keeping track of bribes or something. But in Mistral that hardly mattered, not without names to go with them. Noting so far seemed important. _Significant._ Worth risking her life for.

Was that the door? The general only left an hour ago.

Neo glassed and jumped to the study ceiling, grabbing the edge of the skylight inset. Then she glassed again and flipped through the skylight, landing flat on her back on the roof, on the opposite side of the skylight from the camera she'd spotted. _Just the hard part left._ Neo took a deep breath, glassed again, and heaved the glass back into place. By the time she'd settled it, she was hearing voices.

Neo put in an earbud, plugged it into her scroll, and lay down. She'd say this for Shell: The woman might not have any fancy computer viruses, but her toys were much cooler than any of Neo's previous employers. Not that Neo was getting paid for this, of course.

"-Is my office," said a male voice in Neo's ear. The general, making things easy again. "But I'm sure the finer points can be... glossed over." His voice was deep, rich, and jovial. Who was he talking to?

"Who's watching those camera feeds?" Said the voice of Cinder Fall.

One of the best parts of mutism is that Neo didn't need to suppress a scream. Instead, she only started hyperventilating and wondered if she was going to faint. Neo was mobile, but she hardly felt _powerful_ , and even at her best she could never fight Cinder. Maybe run from her.

Neo willed her heart to stop. It didn't seem to make a difference.

The general responded. "Oh, I disconnect those off the job. It keeps my personal pursuits more... discreet."

"A fine decision," purred Cinder. Neo almost felt sorry for the man. "Tell me, Brian. How many soldiers are you rotating into Diamond's Edge in the next four months?"

"Now Antimony, I hardly think that's an appropriate topic of"

"Brian Jet. Don't you see? You _want_ to tell me your troop rotation for Fort Diamond's Edge."

"I'll have to look it up, but at least three quarters of the troops and half the officers, although the three senior officers will stay." Gone was the man's cheerful tone. He spoke quickly. She had something on him, she had to. But why had he earlier sounded so happy, perhaps even eager?

"Hmm." Cinder was planning something. _Nothing to do with the bug. She can't know it exists._ How did Neo end up here? Did Shell send her in knowing Cinder would be on site? Did Blake?

Hopefully not. _They can't be that stupid._ Cinder was less than 10 feet from unraveling the entire white fang and getting halfway to Ruby besides. At least Cinder couldn't see through ceilings.

"Antimony, just-"

"Brian Jet!" Yelled Cinder. "Why don't you see? You want to speak when spoken to."

The man shut up.

"Now. Let's see what we're going to do. Brian Jet, if you look, you'll see that you want no new troops to be placed in Diamond's Edge, even as the old troops rotate out. In fact, you'll want that many troops to leave the fort within _one_ month. The adjacent watchtowers, too. And you of course don't want to mention me to anybody."

"Yes, Antimony." It didn't sound like intimidation any more. Cinder was doing something to the man. And whatever it was, it wasn't something she could do when Neo knew her last.

"Oh, and Brian Jet. Open your eyes. You obviously want to speak unprompted sometimes, just never to me. I'm leaving. If you see me again, it's because I need to speak to your in private. You'll want to arrange that. Now stay still for an hour." Footsteps.

Neo would give Cinder this: The power suited her perfectly. Neo gave it a five count before she opened her scroll again. She pressed the key to turn off the bug - it might survive one or two inspections if it wasn't broadcasting, although it was too short range to do anything when Neo wasn't nearby - and took out her earbud. She wrapped the cord, placed it in her pocket with her scroll, and got up.

"Oh, Brian Jet!" Cinder shouted from several rooms away, loud enough to hear through the roof. "If you're not blind, you may notice you want to breathe!"

Neo heard a gasp.


	6. Touched

Pilo looked left, and Summer warmed. The snowy dirt path was a downgrade from the paved road she'd been on, but the snow was at least shallower on the path than around it. It almost seemed like some was melting from Pilo's bare proximity. Summer's proximity.

Pilo was still hungry. She grabbed the strap of her pack and pulled it an inch before Summer chilled. _What, do you just want me to starve?_ Summer never had kept her fasting for two days of travel before. There had better be a very good reason.

The path branched off as she walked, or rather, the furrow in the snow did. Pilo looked down every path as they came, but the only warmth she felt was trapped in her layers and layers of clothing.

Finally, after what Pilo's stomach could only assume was hours, the path ended in a cozy looking log cabin. There was smoke rising from the chimney. Out front, a young blonde woman swept snow from her front walk with a broom held in her one hand. She looked up as Pilo drew near.

"Hello?" The woman was hesitant. Nervous. Not sure whether to be confrontational.

Summer stayed quiet, so Pilo did what she wanted to do anyway. "I saw your chimney. May I eat my food by your fire?"

The woman opened her mouth before looking Pilo up and down. "I'm about done here," she decided. "Come inside."

The inside of the house looked much more modern than the outside suggested. Modern electrical wiring and decent insulation on the outside walls. Still not Atlas, of course. The house was built in a U around a central room with doors on its three internal walls and some multi-paned windows on the fourth. In one corner of that room was a raised fireplace, with a small dog curled up in front. It perked up its ears as Pilo and the woman entered the room.

"I'm Yang," the woman said.

"My name is Pilo. Pilo Qutinnguaq. Thank you." Pilo reached out her right hand. The Yang moved her stump for a second. Her face flushed and she turned around.

"I'll be right back. Zwei, bark if you need me." She walked out, keeping the door open to waft some heat to whatever room she was headed.

As she left, Pilo copied her. How often did she really need to double her personal gravity, anyway?

Hmm. An active use. Pilo sat on in a chair in front of the fireplace, unpacked her rations, and turned it on.

So warm! And not just warmth. A stray hair, hanging out over Pilo's face from when she removed her hood, was glowing. She looked at a picture on the wall, showing a couple posing with a blonde toddler and a black-haired baby. The frame of the picture was what mattered.

It was a poor mirror, but Pilo's hair definitely was emitting a gentle brown light. And not only that, but were her eyes red...?

Footsteps. After a few seconds of trying, Pilo was able to turn the semblance off. She unwrapped a trail bar and ate half before Yang made it into the room. The lingering effects of the semblance stayed warm deep inside.

"I have some hot water, if you like." She held a teapot in her hand, with a drawstring pack over her shoulder, and no coat. She set the teapot down on the table next to Pilo's food and flipped her pack around to her front, adding two lightly chipped teacups, one chipped saucer, and a selection of teabags. She looked like she might have more to say, but couldn't figure out how to word it. Whatever _it_ was.

"Thank you," said Pilo. She poured hot water to the brim of one of the cups and started drinking.

"You're not..." Yang began. "Who are you?"

"My name is Pilo Qutinnguaq."

"Yes, but why are you here?" Asked Yang, pouring her own cup of hot water and selecting a teabag, keeping one eye on Pilo.

Oh! Trust. Yang thought she might be dangerous. With Summer around, Pilo tended to forget about suspicion.

"I'm on a journey." Then Pilo added, "I'm trustworthy."

"There's not much on Patch. Where are you headed?"

Patch? Oh, here. Here is patch. Pilo was fairly certain she'd crossed water to be here. An island, most likely. Was the whole island patch? Was the island big enough for towns? It didn't matter.

"I don't know. I didn't plan the journey."

The Yang smiled and tried to be cheerful. "Well, how are you getting off Patch?" By the principle of induction, patch _was_ an island. Or perhaps it wasn't and the woman Yang didn't know that. Pilo was taking a course in formal logic. They might expel her again when they realized she left. Atlas schools were _so_ strict.

Pilo frowned. "A boat, probably." What a weird question. This Yang was a weird person. Pilo finished her water and went back to her ration bar.

"Well, when are you leaving?"

"Iunno," Pilo said through a mouth of granola. "Phrofafly affer thif."

"This?" Yang took a step back, eyes widening. "What's 'this'?"

_Summer? It's her, isn't it?_

Summer warmed.

_What does she get?_

Summer froze in Pilo's veins. Despite sitting next to a fire indoors wearing a coat, she felt like she was naked in the middle of an atlas winter. Summer had never chilled her like this before. Pilo shivered.

It could only mean one thing.

Pilo stood up and swallowed. "I have a gift for you, Yang. Use it well." She lunged forwards, striking with the edge of her hand. Dropping her teacup, yang blocked it with her arm. That was just as well. It could be anywhere, just so long as they touched.

Yang stumbled back, more from surprise than the light touch. She looked at Pilo, angry, then confused. Her eyes blinked from purple to red, then purple, then red, then purple again.

"What did... what did you do?" Yang fell to her knees and then doubled over onto her hand, retching. She began to hyperventilate, clouds of frost puffing from her mouth. Her dog ran up to Pilo and began to bark.

_So. Where to next?_

Pilo pointed a hand in front of her and spun in a slow circle. Summer warmed when she was pointing just to the right of the fire, so she stopped. Pilo took a step, and Summer gave her a warning shiver. _Fine then._

"Hey, Yang." The woman was still on the ground, on her side now, and glaring up at Pilo. Her mouth was forming words, but all that came from her frosty lips was ice. "You have to go that way." She pointed. "I thought it was me, but it's you. Sorry for the confusion."

Yang, her hand around her stomach, reached her stump up towards Pilo. Frost began to collect on the tip, forming an icicle. Her dog ran from the room.

"That's, um..." Pilo rooted through a pocket. It was the wrong pocket. Next pocket, she found her compass. "That's due north. All right?"

The icicle grew longer, and with a grinding sound, bent in half. Yang stared at Pilo with raw hate in her eyes. That was unusual. Most people like gifts.

Oh well, maybe she'd like a second gift, and Pilo didn't need a compass anyway with Summer around. She left it on the table by her teacup. "It'll be a trip. I hope that's all right. I know this is sudden and all. Thanks for inviting me in, you have a lovely home, but I think I have to go." After a moment she added the rest of her trail rations. Summer would find her more food.

Pilo looked back at Yang, who was reaching towards her with a fully articulated hand made of ice. Yang caught a glimpse and turned to her stump, wide-eyed, like she just realized what she'd done. Then she vomited a pile of half-frozen food slush and passed out.

Pilo dragged her body to a wall near the fireplace, wiped her mouth, and propped her into a sitting position. Then she looked for a dustpan or something around the house, but she couldn't find one around the house and Summer was getting impatient, so she just scooped what slush she could into the teacups and set them back on the table. Yang's new arm was melting, but the hardwood looked treated.

_Summer, did you see any paper or something around?_

No response.

_I'm doing this because you want me to, you know._

Still nothing.

Pilo took out her scroll and typed, ʀᴇᴍᴇᴍʙᴇʀ, ɢᴏ ɴᴏʀᴛʜ! ᴘs ғᴏᴏᴅ ɪs ɢᴏᴏᴅ, ɪs ɴᴏᴛ ᴘᴏɪsᴏɴᴇᴅ. Satisfied, she turned off the scroll's lock and left it on the table next to the compass. Then she bundled back up and left the cabin, burning her semblance to stay warm.

_So. Where to next?_


	7. Get Action

Neo pinned her feet under her box spring and sat up. It had been a while since she'd been wound up enough to exercise. Nonviolence, even when so many deserved it. Everyone agreed on that! In fact, with the exception of the people that deserved it, everyone even agreed on who. It was as black and white was it could get.

Twenty three, twenty four. Neo rolled over and began some push-ups. The worst part was that she wasn't even being told to do it. Well, not exactly. She'd been the one to request jobs requiring a subtle touch. Covert. Good for her semblance.

Twenty three, twenty four. Back to sit-ups. This was all Ruby's fault. The stupid girl had left her here while she was off doing who knows what. Probably not even in Mistral any more. It had been weeks now. Ruby loved her. She'd said it.

Twenty three, twenty four. Jumping jacks. And what had Ruby given that love up for? Her uncle. He swept in with an offer of protection, and Ruby decided she didn't need Neo any more. Simple. Obvious.

Forty seven, fourty eight. Kata. Left arm was still weak, especially against resistance. Neo had decided to trust Ruby. Was it still worthwhile? Was the reason simply that obnoxious white fang scout? If only she knew how much trouble she'd caused. From Neo's life up to the fate of the kingdoms. There were stakes here, stakes much higher than some temper tantrum.

Sixteen, and rest. Not enough bed for Neo to wedge her feet under the box springs. She skipped to her push-ups rep. Cinder was moving. Clearing out border forts for some strike somewhere. Why was Neo fighting her again?

Twenty four. Onto strikes. Ruby said she knew how to defeat Cinder. Said she had a power. Neo hadn't _just_ justified fighting Cinder because Ruby could beat her. Neo had justified fighting _at all_ because Ruby was by her side. And now here she was, working as a special agent to another criminal boss, not even getting paid for her role in her hopeless, loveless fight.

Mid-strike, Neo's hand was caught. Oh. Shell had entered her room.

Oh. Neo had destroyed her door.

Oh. Neo had destroyed her room.

"Perhaps you'd like to see Belle," suggested the lieutenant.

Neo nodded. That sounded pleasant.

Neo couldn't see much of Shell's outfit, besides the back of her mask and her cape woven from matted vines. All else she could see was the exoskeleton running the length of her arms. Shell did like the sleeveless look, to show off her trait. Some did. It was more common in the white fang, of course, but Neo had known others that liked to be up front. Present the information and watch the reaction. Neo's mother had been the same. Appropriate, Neo felt like a child trailing behind the lieutenant.

Shell stopped, turned around, looked Neo up and down, the continued down the hall. It wasn't necessary, of course. Neo knew where to find Blake's office. Still, the woman walked to the door and knocked.

"Yes?" Came Blake's voice.

"Lita would like to discuss something with you." Lita wasn't a name that Neo had ever used before, except in very inconsequential situations. It had just been a look then, and it was just a name now. In theory, it shouldn't let anybody know who she was at all, which was the best she could hope for out of a name.

"Come in. I just finished something."

Shell opened the door and ushered Neo in. Perhaps she'd just been ensuring the health and safety of the hallway. Neo took a seat in front of Blake while Shell closed the two in.

"Neo. What's on your mind?"

ɪᴛ's ʙᴇᴇɴ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛᴡᴏ ᴡᴇᴇᴋs sɪɴᴄᴇ ɪ ᴋɪʟʟᴇᴅ ᴀɴʏᴏɴᴇ.

"I'm giving you missions based on your preference," Blake sounded hesitant. "Have those changed?"

It wasn't... well, maybe it was. It was hard to explain. Neo erased half of her message. ɪᴛ's ʙᴇᴇɴ ᴏᴠᴇʀ ᴛᴡᴏ ᴡᴇᴇᴋs sɪɴᴄᴇ ɪ ғᴏᴜɢʜᴛ.

"You want a fight."

ʏᴇs. No special message, no moral, no deeper philosophical meaning. Neo was a fighter. Fighters fight. This was certainly the longest she'd gone without a fight since age 12. Possibly the longest she'd gone without killing since... Well, she killed one private when fighting Mercury... age 16? 17? A lot more recent, but before she'd met Cinder.

"Do you want to get your hands dirty, or are you talking about sparring? I really don't have many able to give you a run, especially not ones I can spare for bed rest after. Have you ever thought about being a trainer?"

Neo pointed to her throat.

"Yes, it would be hard. How about with Shell?"

Neo lowered her eyebrows. What about her?

"She's articulate. You could teach a class together. Get some of my sergeants up to snuff. Maybe not be so alone next time we're ambushed in the field. And yes, 'next time.'"

Neo shook her head. ᴛᴇᴀᴄʜɪɴɢ ɪsɴ'ᴛ ғɪɢʜᴛɪɴɢ.

Blake shook her head. "I know. I'm just a bit strapped for talent here."

ᴀɴᴅ ɪ ᴅᴏɴ'ᴛ ʟɪᴋᴇ sʜᴇʟʟ.

That got her attention. "Why not?"

ʏᴏᴜ ᴛʀᴜsᴛ ʜᴇʀ ᴛᴏᴏ ᴇᴀsʏ. sʜᴇ ʜᴀsɴ'ᴛ ᴇᴀʀɴᴇᴅ ɪᴛ.

Blake made a note on her keyboard. "You don't trust much, do you?"

ɪ ᴏɴʟʏ ᴛʀᴜsᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴀs ғᴀʀ ᴀs ɪ ᴄᴀɴ ᴋɪʟʟ ʏᴏᴜ ɪғ ʏᴏᴜ ʙᴇᴛʀᴀʏ ᴍᴇ.

"Well, for what it's worth, Neo, I trust you. I need competent people on my side." Blake went back to her computer, removing her mask and shaking out some hair that was pinned underneath. "I have enough of them trying to tear this whole thing apart. I can put you on a protection detail, but those are pretty low combat, and it's not a position for killing, if that _is_ your aim. Highest combat I have is wilderness escort, but I don't want to lose track of you for that long."

Blake was right about that. ɪ ɴᴇᴇᴅ ᴛᴏ ʙᴇ ʜᴇʀᴇ ᴡʜᴇɴ ᴄɪɴᴅᴇʀ ᴀᴛᴛᴀᴄᴋs. ᴛᴏᴜʀɴᴀᴍᴇɴᴛ ʀᴜʟᴇs.

"Tournament rules?"

ʟᴏᴡ ᴀᴜʀᴀ ᴇʟɪᴍɪɴᴀᴛɪᴏɴ. ɢᴇᴛ sᴏᴍᴇ ᴍᴇɴ ᴛᴏɢᴇᴛʜᴇʀ. ʏᴏᴜ ᴄᴀɴ ᴊᴏɪɴ.

"Yes, I can put a post out for some off-duty hopefuls." Blake typed as she spoke. "I'll let Shell cull the list. She knows people's capabilities better than you. As for me joining, absolutely not. I can't be seen losing in front of my men. I don't even want to be seen winning poorly. And I'd rather keep my exact capabilities from the spies undoubtedly lurking around the base."

There was one final item of note. ɪ ʙʀᴏᴋᴇ ᴍʏ ʀᴏᴏᴍ.

"You broke... your room."

sᴛʀᴇss ʀᴇʟɪᴇғ. Neo felt herself blush. It was such a juvenile reaction. A juvenile situation in the first place. Couldn't she just control her mind like she controlled her body? Wasn't that supposed to be the easy part?

Blake sighed. "Can you stay in it for a night?"

She'd slept in worst spots. Her blankets might even be salvageable after she shook the splinters out.

 _Maybe I need a new prescription._ And what luck. Blake was the perfect person to ask.


	8. All I Came For

He'd sent the kids ahead once they left the town. He needed them out of his feathers if he was going to quit. The path north was sputtering out, leading into sparse forest.

Qrow took an energy bar from his pack and balanced it on a branch, then he shifted. He flew onto the branch and pecked at the bar with his beak. Tasted terrible as a bird. Everything does. In seconds, he was full.

Qrow hopped off into a glide and shifted back. He wrapped and stowed the rest of the bar; he'd be sated past lunch on those crumbs. He didn't envy the kids, with their backpacks full of food. Consuming things at a one to one ratio.

Dealing with the kids again reminded him. Qrow took out his flask, unscrewed it, and balanced it on a branch. He'd quit tomorrow. He'd always quit tomorrow. Tomorrow, when the world was saved.

A portal tore through the air nearby. Black and red. Magic. Domain of the fair folk. Qrow had a visitor.

Fair folk tended not to travel outside their city. "Raven."

"Brother." Qrow's sister nodded, sheathing her sword. She wasn't wearing her mask.

"They letting you out on walks now? Going for a tinkle?" Qrow saw Raven so infrequently, he had to get his jabs in while he could.

"Cinder is in Mistral. Why did you leave?" Raven was, as ever, to the point. Also pushy. Accusing. Raven.

"Hey, _I_ didn't do a thing. Talk to the Argent. She says north, north we fly." Qrow grabbed his flask from the branch and took a swig. He'd grabbed another bottle in town. Could afford a human-sized gulp or two.

"Turn around. We started in Vale because the world's eyes watched, but Mistral will fall within the month. You can still make it back if you hurry."

"Sister dearest, I'd almost think you were trying to keep me away from something." Siblings had to understand each other, at least a little.

"I'm trying!" Raven yelled, "to keep you alive! It's what I..." She stopped speaking, the black veins working their way past her collar and up her neck.

Qrow wanted to believe that the lines were smaller than ever. The magic weakening, losing control. Or that they were more prominent than he'd seen them, overextending, fighting a losing battle.

He wanted to, but he was far too sober to see them as anything expect exactly the same size they'd always been.

"We have an Argent _and_ we have me. We'll be fine." That's the thing about Raven. She said she didn't report back. But then, of course she would say that.

" _I_ had an argent and _I_ had you." Raven moved her hand to her sword, although she'd never draw. She was careful about drawing. Someone probably checked her dust levels every day or two. Or hour. Qrow didn't know how it worked. Raven alternated between refusing to tell him and denying that there was any process at all.

"Well, now I know more. Get underground. Move fast. Avoid the southern wing."

"It won't work!" Raven drew her sword and cut the tree in two in one motion. "They're still working on Summer's bug. Do you want to give them silver eyes?"

Qrow stepped to the side. "It still won't work," he said over the sound of the tree landing where he'd stood. "Not like they have a way to test it."

"Oh? Do you want to be the one to tell Yang that Ruby _got lost_ like her mother?"

"Why, do you? I don't know if you know," Qrow was sure that she knew, "but Yang isn't having the best year right now."

"I'm doing what I can," said Raven. And then, more quietly, "that's cruel."

"Maybe you should _consider_ being able to do more." Qrow drew Reaper and batted her sword to the side. "Unless you'd prefer that I end your endless struggle right now."

She swung back, and Qrow parried. "You're lucky they still think you're with her. They won't send me to fight you both. Go get drunk so you can catch up already."

Qrow gave her a low cut, which she blocked, anchoring her sword in the ground. He couldn't beat her, of course. "And then we turn back. That's your plan."

"It's her life, Qrow." Raven gave him a flurry of stabs, which Qrow dodged until he couldn't, then blocked. "All of their lives."

"Then I go back to Mistral and get into a tussle with Autumn. While the only maiden I can marshal is completely cracked, and even that's assuming she hasn't given Ironwood the slip again." Raven stopped attacking when he started talking, so Qrow transformed Reaper and tried some swings. "I don't like those odds."

"You don't trust Ruby to fight a half-grimm maiden," Raven extended her sword to gain some distance, "yet you're bringing her to us?"

"All she did last time was stall them, Raven. That's it. It wasn't a victory. In fact, I'd call it a defeat. And Cinder was only half of a maiden. She didn't have Inner Storm." Qrow stopped his attacks. It was childish. Neither sibling could hope to win. They knew each other too well for that. "Now Ruby, she's good at what she does. Manifested the eyes six whole years before her mother. If I'm betting the world on a freak chance, I'd like to at least win if it pays off. Maybe it's safer to go to Mistral and try to delay them, but Ozpin's gone, and that means we lose the long game."

Raven was silent for a moment, then turned away from him. "East wing." She slashed a portal. "They're about to miss me. All the way east. It won't be easy." She took a step.

"Raven."

Raven stopped on the threshold of her portal home.

"Was it worth it?" Asked Qrow. "Was I worth it?"

"No." She sheathed her blade. "But she was." And Raven stepped through and was gone.

Qrow stowed Reaper and finished his flask. _Of course Summer was worth it. That's why_ I _volunteered, before you knocked me out and took my place._

Sisters. Can't live with em.


	9. Now and Forever

 The figure in front of Neo lunged, stabbing with his cutlass. She dodged, leaning under the punch the maned man behind her threw. That left the third one to fire his pistol. One shot hit, knocking air from her lungs. Another and she was done for. She had to get to that pistol.

Neo transitioned her lean into a backbend and pivoted to spring up into a handstand. She grabbed the lion faunus's arm between her legs and flipped in midair, inverting him and hiding behind his bulk.

She loosened her legs before she landed, letting the man land on his head. Neo grabbed his foot and swung him around at the shooter. Should keep him busy. The man with the sword sliced again, but stayed far enough away that dodging was easy. He was waiting for his comrades before he reengaged. Smart.

Neo dove under a swing and tackled him, throwing her arms around his waist. He brought his sword hand in, but Neo struck it, knocking his hand away. Turning, she bullrushed him into the other two, knocking all of them sprawling, and kicked each when they tried to rise.

"Match." The referee nodded to Neo and the others on the mat. "Lita is the winner. Belle asked to see you when you finished."

Neo looked at the scoreboard. 23, 19, 7, 16, 91. One hit from a loss. Yesterday, she'd been hit to 86, losing with two opponents still standing. Some white fang officers were better than others.

She retrieved Iris's pieces from the corner of the mat, reassembled her, and took the hallway out from the gym. Blake was just outside the door, holding a bag.

"Lita. Come with me." The pair walked to the building's lot and Blake pointed to a car. _Why now? Why me?_ Neo worked alone.

The only reason Blake would want Neo's company was for protection. Obviously, it was somewhere Shell wouldn't do. Or something came up and Shell had to handle it. "I'm headed somewhere public and you won't look too out of place. Protect me. I'll drive, you need to type."

ᴡʜᴀᴛ ɢᴏᴏᴅ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴛʏᴘɪɴɢ

"Turn on the voice." Blake got into the driver's seat and closed the door.

Neo stood outside her window and crossed her arms.

"Just use the voice, Lita." They were alone in the garage, but Blake was strict with names. "I can't read your scroll while watching traffic."

Neo didn't move. Neo wasn't a true believer. Neo wasn't contracted. Neo didn't owe Blake a thing.

"Fine." Blake pointed to her right. "Just get in and listen to me."

Neo circled the car and entered. If Blake accepted that she would lose battles against Neo, their partnership would proceed much more amicably.

"All right then. We're headed to Haven. I'm meeting some people. Needed someone my age to stay low profile. Are you a faunus?" Blake pulled onto the street.

"I'm hearing rumblings about it, is all. I'm basically sitting on a pile of a thousand career criminals that will blow up if I make any mistakes or push them or try to disband so I figure keeping them happy is a priority. They're not so sure about me having a human bodyguard." Blake turned onto an on-ramp. "Or whatever you are these days. I try not to need guards, but if I get hit on campus, running away will look terrible for me and you can just change your looks until the dust settles."

Neo typed on her scroll and held it up.

"And humanity isn't always a liability. I want to bring Haven in on this fight somehow. Your intel says Cinder's consumed the military, the PD are a joke, we need huntsmen. But this being Mistral, I don't know who at the schools to trust. You're from Mistral. Do you have any experience with the professors?"

At a light, Blake turned to look. Neo was still presenting her scroll. ᴍʏ ᴍᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ᴡᴀs ᴀ ғᴀᴜɴᴜs.

"I assume you mean you're not." Blake sighed. "When were you last in Mistral? Do you know Haven? Which professors to trust?"

Neo typed. Blake didn't look.

"I'm thinking of going to Professor Gintaras."

Neo typed more obviously, slamming her fingers down on each key, and held her scroll up. Blake continued to drive.

"I also like the look of Professor Pirin."

 _No. No you don't._ Neo glared while she typed, then reached out her hand, holding her scroll almost in front of Blake's face.

The car swerved as Blake pushed Neo's arm away from her vision. "Neo, just use the voice, we're on a highway!"

Fine. It _needed_ to be said. "ɪғ ʏᴏᴜ ᴘᴜᴛ ᴍᴇ ɪɴ ᴀ ʀᴏᴏᴍ ᴡɪᴛʜ ᴘɪʀɪɴ ɪ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴋɪʟʟ ʏᴏᴜ ʙᴏᴛʜ," Neo's scroll announced in monotone.

To her credit, Blake didn't gloat, realizing that the voice was punishment enough. Rather, she looked worried. "So, you don't think Pirin is a good choice."

He might help, but Neo was far from _that_ desperate. "ᴘɪʀɪɴ ɪs ᴀ ʙᴀᴅ ᴍᴀɴ. ᴛʀʏ ɢᴜʟɪsᴛᴀɴ."

Blake took an exit off the highway. "Neo, I'm going to be honest, I can't tell how seriously I should be taking you."

"ɪ ᴅᴏɴ'ᴛ ᴊᴏᴋᴇ ᴡɪᴛʜ ʏᴏᴜ. ɢᴜʟɪsᴛᴀɴ."

"I read Pirin's faculty bio, he's been teaching for years. Are you saying that he's dangerous? Hurtful? Mean?" The neighborhood was residential. They were close.

"ᴅʀᴏᴘ ɪᴛ ʙᴇʟʟᴀᴅᴏɴɴᴀ," Neo glared. She'd almost managed to forget about Pirin before Blake went and brought the man up. She might have to go kill the man anyway, on her own time.

"Neo, I trust you. I'm trusting you, but I have friends at Haven. If they're in danger... if there's a problem, I want to confront it."

"ʜᴀᴠᴇɴ sᴛᴜᴅᴇɴᴛs ᴀʀᴇ ғᴀʀ ᴛᴏᴏ ᴏʟᴅ ғᴏʀ ʜɪᴍ," read the scroll.

Neo stared out of her side window.

From the sounds of things, Blake turned her head, but only for a moment. Then she drove for a minute in silence. Neo didn't know this neighborhood. Never had.

Neo typed. "ɪ ᴍɪss ʀᴜʙʏ."

"Me too, Neo," said Blake. "I miss my whole team. I miss being a follower. Leading is just a series of questions with no right answers." Blake turned right. "Ruby left the city while you were in the hospital. She went north." She took a left at the end of the block and stopped in front of a booth, where a security guard looked at the car's occupants and raised the barrier.

Bake rolled down her window. "Excuse me. Could you point me in the direction of Professor Gulistan's office?"


	10. Somewhere Else to Be

On the beach, Yang laughed.

It began as a smile, then a slow chuckle. Soon she was went straight through belly laughs to wheezing when her lungs refused to suck in enough air. She doubled over and collapsed on the wet sand, caking it into her hair.

"What," she wheezed between breaths, "am I doing?" She could feel frost build on her lips when she spoke. It felt cold, but not cold as she was used to it. It didn't hurt. It was like mint, minus the mint. The whole world tasted fresh.

She assumed she would reach some life-changing epiphany miles ago. What happened now that she ran out of north?

Yang picked herself up with both arms and gazed across the ocean. Nothing as far as the eye could see. If she got a boat and headed east, or northeast, or north by north by north by northeast, she'd reach the mainland. But straight north would lead her through a whole lotta nothing.

"She's insane," Yang declared. "She's nuts! There's nothing here!" Her shout went unanswered.

"Fine."

Yang sat down on the beach, brushed the worst from her hair with her hand and her other hand, and broke out lunch. She'd brought Pilo's nutrition bars because dust, after a day like that, why would Pilo poison her after leaving? All the food was weighing her down. Everything seemed heavier now without her fire — apparently it had some effect when not active, because her hair made it quite hard to turn her neck — but even on that scale, the woman had brought a lot of very dense food with her.

Too dense to consume on its own, and Yang was down to her last bottle of water. _I wonder..?_

Yang opened her mouth and condensed ice on her tongue. It felt almost like gum. She closed her mouth again and willed it to melt. Yang couldn't make it warm. She could only stop it from being ice. Her power, her semblance, stopped after that. But it was pure, distilled, and the temperature wasn't a problem.

_Guess I can toss the bottle._

Yang had expected to find her second arm odd, hard to handle, difficult to get used to. Instead, it just made her realize how little she'd adapted to losing one. She was herself again, well, herself without her fire but maybe a second arm was a worthwhile trade. _Maybe._ Yang still wasn't happy about the way Pilo had made the call on her own. But apparently she didn't hold much of a grudge, because she'd boarded Zwei and followed the woman's compass north the next day.

And found nothing along the way. _Go north._ What did it mean? What did Pilo know? Or whoever planned her trip? Why couldn't someone, for once, just tell Yang the truth?

Yang exhaled her frustrations, frosting the beach nearby. The cold rippled outwards, freezing the surf next to her, then ten feet away, then twenty.

That... that would be stupid.

"All right, Pilo." Yang lay down on the sand, which stuck to her less when frozen together. "I came north. I don't know how you did what you did, but here I am." There was something she was supposed to do, or find, or be. Or should she just go back home, wait for dad to call back, and tell him the news? "Some woman came over and changed my semblance and now I have an arm made of ice." How would he take it? She'd had to feed the fire much more aggressively to keep Zwei warm in the house. She had the option of melting her arm. Without keeping ice around, she was barely even cooler than normal.

Of course, that would mean having one arm, even if just for a little while. Yang held it before her face, examining the fingers. The material was uniform, but she could swear there were tendons and veins textured onto the surface if she looked close. She could form other objects, but nothing with detail this fine. Couldn't even make other things move. This was the exception. This was _her._

Yang grabbed Ember Celica from her bag and put the left bracelet on, then the right. It fit perfectly. She expanded the gauntlet, and for that stretch of wrist, couldn't even tell it wasn't a normal arm. The gauntlet looked good. Ruby's handiwork. Yang hadn't taken it so well at the time, but it had only meant the girl was optimistic.

Ruby would be in Mistral now, with Juniper. Changing the world. Fighting the people that nearly destroyed Vale. They'd be outnumbered. On unfamiliar territory. Wishing Yang had agreed to come along.

Or maybe forgetting about her entirely. Yang could party, Yang could excite, Yang could fight. But not win, not if her last battles were any indication. She'd helped the team, all right, against Grimm. Or when Blake could slingshot her into the enemy. Blake beat Roman in that train car. Ruby fought Cinder in the tower. Yang couldn't keep up with trained hunters, not on her own. She was just too slow.

Yang stood up.

"Sorry, Roman." She pointed at a rock on the sand about fifteen feet away. "Be a shame if you got... _cold feet_." Ice grew around it, encasing it entirely after a few seconds.

Great. She could stop Roman from moving if he was already immobile. _Anyone_ could avoid ice growing that quickly. Yang could.

Yang held out her hands and grew icicles. That only took a second or two. Then she threw them, one after the other. She had power, even without her fire, but she couldn't keep them on target without tumbling around in the air. Yang was no Gwen Darcy.

Yang grew a sword. Like the daggers, it didn't stick to her hands. She started with an icicle, adding a handguard and sharpening the edges.

She tested the edges. It wasn't very sharp. _Great. I can make an estoc._ Piercing attacks weren't very good against aura in the first place, much less in the hands of someone that had never trained with them. Much less in the hands of someone too slow to fight.

Was this why she was here? To get her outside and planning, trying new things? In that case, was she supposed to stay here until she figured out something that worked? A way to use her power to fight in a world of speed? Attacks that can't be dodged quite so easily?

Or was Yang supposed to do the stupid thing?

She turned her gaze northward. The waves had frozen mid-crest, leaving an uneven surface. Where the ice stopped, water lapped over the edges.

Yang approached and stepped on the ice, willing it cooler. Immediately, the water around it froze, and the water around that. The ice now extended to the sand underneath for twenty feet around. Thirty.

Yang walked out onto it. She could keep a radius of forty feet frozen pretty easily, more if she exerted herself. It no longer reached the sand underneath. The ice behind her remained, although it would melt, in time. Then she'd be on an island. An iceberg.

Still, forty feet of ice would float, and stay upright besides. The waves were gentle.

"What do I owe her anyway?"

"I guess I should walk home and finish sweeping the yard."

Yang walked north.


	11. Girls  of Valour

Blake closed her door and locked it. Neo followed her up the steps and through the building's double doors, where Blake studied the building map on the wall. Neo studied the students rushing by. She was supposed to be a bodyguard. So she guarded. She'd done it plenty of times before, most recently with Roman. Never failed a charge yet. Although once or twice she'd had qualified successes.

Like, for instance, with Roman. She'd succeeded in not letting anyone else harm him...

"Second floor." The foyer had stairs, which Blake took. Then a left, another left, and they entered a very quiet hall. Gulistan's door was solid wood, with a plaque and a sheet for office hours. The door was closed. The next one listed was tomorrow.

Blake turned back to Neo. "All of my choices were available today. Why Gulistan?"

Neo fitted her stuffed-finger glove on her right hand before typing. Probably a good habit to wear it in public. Gulistan would be a trial run. ɪ ᴛʀᴜsᴛ ʜᴇʀ ɴᴏᴛ ᴛᴏ ᴛᴀʟᴋ.

"Her?"

Neo knocked on the door. There was a rustle before it opened. Pulling the door in was a hand reaching across a desk, knocking a few papers to join the rest on the floor.

"Hello? Who is it?" Gulistan was a small woman - large to Neo - in her forties, with curly pink hair in a pink suit with a checkered white and grey jacket. Frankly, she looked great.

"Hello, Professor." Blake stepped into the office, which would barely have room for a chair on either side of the desk if there _hadn't_ been any papers around. "Call me Belle."

"Sorry, Belle," droned Gulistan. "My office hours are on my door. If you'll excuse me..."

"We're not students," answered Blake, crowding in so that Neo could step past the threshold. "We're here because the fate of Mistral is at stake and you can help."

Gulistan exhaled, blowing a stray hair curl off of her forehead. "Whoever sent you, you can tell them you managed to bother me and go along with your day, and I won't have to get security involved."

Blake shot Neo a skeptical look. Neo held up her scroll. ᴡᴏᴜʟᴅ ɪ ʙᴏᴛʜᴇʀ ʏᴏᴜ ɪғ ɪ ᴀsᴋᴇᴅ ᴡʜᴀᴛ ʏᴏᴜ ᴅᴏ ᴛʜᴇ ғɪʀsᴛ sᴜɴᴅᴀʏ ᴏғ ᴇᴀᴄʜ ᴍᴏɴᴛʜ? ɪ ʜᴇᴀʀ ʜᴀʙɪᴛs ᴀʀᴇ ʙᴀᴅ.

Gulistan blanched. Blake glared.

"Excuse us for a moment," said Blake, shoving Neo out the door and closing it. They were still alone in the hallway. "What does she do on sundays?" She hissed.

ɴᴏᴛʜɪɴɢ ʙᴀᴅ. ʙᴜʏs ᴅʀᴜɢs, ᴡᴇ ᴄᴀɴ ᴜsᴇ ɪᴛ.

"Is this why you chose her? Because she's compromised? What if someone else tries to blackmail her?"

ɪғ sʜᴇ ʜᴇʟᴘs ᴄɪɴᴅᴇʀ, ᴛʜᴇ ᴄɪᴛʏ ɢᴇᴛs ᴅᴇsᴛʀᴏʏᴇᴅ ᴀɴᴅ ɴᴏʙᴏᴅʏ ᴡɪʟʟ ᴄᴀʀᴇ ᴡʜᴀᴛ sʜᴇ's ᴏɴ. Blake was making this a lot more complicated than it needed to be, but then, she was the academic type. There were only two factions that mattered. Cinder, and humanity.

"What if... ugh, never mind." Blake opened the door and sat down in the chair. Neo maneuvered herself behind and somehow shut the door. Gulistan, to her credit, remained composed.

"What do you want?" The professor asked, eyes moving between the two.

"Lita, play the recording."

"Who's watching those camera feeds?" Came the voice of Cinder Fall.

Gulistan took a moment to understand what she was hearing, but once she did, she listened very carefully. Blake stayed silent until the recording was done. "That's the voice of the woman who masterminded the Vytal attack. We think she wants an encore. And the Mistral armed forces aren't in a position to stop it."

"So you want an army."

"I want mobilization. When the grimm came to Vale, they were on us before we knew what had happened. If grimm run over the northwestern border forts, humanity needs a front on the farmland, before they reach the city. I have some men in waiting, and Lita will be joining them, but we'll need reinforcements. The scale is too large for me and mine."

"Who are your men?"

Blake responded before Neo could finish typing her vague threat. "The white fang, as of last month. And if you like the city's current crime rate I wouldn't recommend jeopardizing that. We're both on the same side here."

"So you're the leader of the white fang..."

"New leader," interrupted Blake. "And new associate."

"The new leader of the white fang, and you're using the white fang to defend Mistral from a terrorist who blackmailed a General into mismanaging our northwestern border forts." When she put it that way, it almost sounded silly.

"I don't know what Cinder Fall's end goal is," said Blake, "but everyone in Mistral stands to lose from it."

ʏᴏᴜ ᴀʀᴇ ʟᴇᴠᴇʟ ʜᴇᴀᴅᴇᴅ, ᴄᴏᴍᴘᴇᴛᴇɴᴛ ᴀɴᴅ ᴀ ɢᴏᴏᴅ ᴏʀɢᴀɴɪᴢᴇʀ, added Neo.

"Right." Blake pointed to the scroll. "You come recommended. We want you to see about mobilizing the Mistral Corps. The attack will likely be this month, likely at night. Cinder will notice anything obvious. You'll have to be covert."

ᴛᴜʀɴɪɴɢ ᴏɴ ᴜs ᴡɪʟʟ ᴅᴇsᴛʀᴏʏ ᴛʜᴇ ᴋɪɴɢᴅᴏᴍ, reminded Neo. ᴄɪɴᴅᴇʀ ʜᴀs ɴᴏ ᴀʟʟɪᴇs ᴀɴᴅ ʙʀᴏᴋᴇʀs ɴᴏ ᴘᴇᴀᴄᴇ.

Neo caught Blake's eye. "No need to worry, Lita. She has nothing on us in the first place." Good. Blake seemed smart. She liked books. Fiction, but still.

"I'll make some inquiries," said Gulistan.

Neo showed Blake her scroll, which read ᴡᴏʀᴋ ғɪʀsᴛ.

"Well, get some trusted huntsmen on call first. And don't be obvious about it. Cinder can force people to... as you heard."

"Yes." She drew the word out. "I know a thing or two about discretion. If Mistral needs us, it will have huntsmen."

Blake stood and shook the professor's hand. "I'll call you if I need to, but I doubt your call to action will come from your scroll."

The ride home was silent. Blake took a roundabout route to watch for tails, but Neo didn't spot any. As they pulled into the base garage level, the woman blurted out, "I miss my family."

"Do you miss your family?" She continued before Neo could type. "No, you don't. You wouldn't. You have too much going on."

Neo showed Blake her scroll after she parked. ɪ ᴍɪss ʀᴏᴍᴀɴ.

Blake nodded. "I miss Adam. Not how he was at the end. When times were good, they were great."

Neo looked at her five-fingered glove. ʀᴏᴍᴀɴ ʜᴀᴅ sᴜᴄʜ ᴄᴏᴍᴘᴀssɪᴏɴ. _Has._

"Adam never did. Stay vigilant, Lita. I half expect a coup every time I leave."

Neo followed Blake into the base. She could kill Pirin tomorrow. Nobody would know.


	12. Here

"What we find when we move this will be unlike anything you've seen before." Uncle Qrow hung the cane on his belt and took a drink from his flask. "And if we find our way to the fair city, double it. But that won't be easy."

Ren bent down to inspect the metal slab. It might have been a wall, once. The base's armored outer wall. What was he looking for? "We did not make this journey because it was easy."

"Good." Qrow took another swig, thought for a moment, and spit onto the thawing snow. "We'll need to move this or hack through it. Would anybody like to do the honors?"

Something had placed a piece of metal twenty five feet to a side and nearly a foot thick above the way down. What had that kind of strength? Was one side bent up because of how it was moved? Crescent wouldn't even be able to dent it. She should fix it. A new alloy, maybe. Diamond blade? No, too brittle, no point in taking that risk even if aura would mostly cover it up. Maybe a backup tungsten alloy blade of some kind? With a mechanism to...

The fair folk, Qrow said. Their city was underground, or they could get to it underground. The origin of grimm. They had a lot to answer for.

Why had they done it?

"How big is the underground?" asked Jaune, surveying the ring of long-ruined rubble stretching hundreds of feet around them.

"Big, but that doesn't matter. We want the east wing. All the way east."

Nubu walked over to where the bend left a gap over the ground and lay down underneath it. "Please be ready." Her voice was a bit muffled.

Ruby circled around to look. Nubu was laying on her back, hands stretched up to press on the metal. She was biting her lip and sweating. "Nubu, maybe we should cut through"

With a groan and a crunch of disturbed snow, the slab began to lift. In a moment it was past Nubu's reach, so she lay her hands down at her sides and watched, body sinking inches into the ground as the metal pivoted on its opposite edge and swung upright, revealing a hole ten feet wide leading straight downwards.

 _Action and reaction. Her aura shouldered that weight._ Nubu's skin had gotten pale.

The heads from four king taijitu popped out.

"Well now, that was fast." Qrow drew Reaper.

Ruby unfurled Crescent. One head lunged for Nubu, now nearly embedded in the ground. The girl took the bite with an ineffectual spasm, the taijitu gouging furrows in the ground around her and tossing her dozens of feet in the air.

Ruby took off after Nubu's trajectory, barely managing to catch her as she landed. Behind her, Ruby heard Jaune's shout of "Everybody back!" followed by a resounding crash. She turned, grunting at Nubu's unexpected weight, to see the slab settling back into place. Next to it a taijitu head, severed when the slab fell, was beginning to dissolve.

Ruby bent to the side, touching Nubu's feet to the ground. "Thank you, Miss Rose," she said between gasps, standing. Even spent as she was, the girl looked sheepish for needing help. Almost like she didn't understand what teams were for. It was so simple, if only the girl let herself accept it. Nubu needed a Yang to comfort her. To teach her how to be comforted. Or just a better leader.

Ruby tried to lead, the best she could, but how good was she? Was she even a leader at all? Jaune was the head of Ren's team, his old team, his real team, and the one with Nubu's sister. And Qrow was leading them all. And before Qrow, Nubu had joined a team led by Neo. Joined because of Neo, even.

Neo. She'd tried _so hard_ for Ruby.

"So, what now?" asked Ren after Ruby and Nubu walked back. Nubu glanced at the slab, now pressed even further into the ground from the impact, and her face fell.

"Hold on, Ren," ordered Jaune. "Before we continue, I just want to pause for a second and appreciate how amazing it was the Nubu was able to lift this thing. It must be, what, a couple tons? And her semblance... she feels it, on the other end."

Ruby nodded. "That's true, but we need a way in. Uncle Qrow, can Reaper cut through it?"

"I'm sorry," said Nubu, studying the snow by her feet.

"Hey, you did great." Jaune clasped her sweaty hand in his own. "Don't be so hard on yourself, Nubu. You've done your part, now we'll find another way. Or we can rest up and open it tomorrow."

Nubu looked at Jaune's hands around hers and caught her breath. "I will succeed this time."

"I..." began Jaune.

"We'll make sure nothing eats you," said Qrow. He hadn't put Reaper away.

So Nubu wedged herself in the crack underneath, slowed her breathing, and tried again. She avoided the spot with her old indentation.

She didn't bother to place her hands on it. She lay still, straight as a board, and stared at the metal above her. Then she ground her teeth and glared. Ruby stood beside her and readied Crescent, the others — Ruby couldn't think of a good team name with a Q — next to her, doing the same.

All was still, at first. Then there was a grinding sound, loud, drowning out Nubu's scream. The metal swung upwards and toppled over backwards, revealing the passage.

One taijitu reared up. Uncle Qrow leapt forward and killed it with a swing.

"Is that it?" asked Ruby, still, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"The other taijitu were crushed earlier," answered Ren, helping free Nubu from her foot-deep Nubu-shaped hole. The girl was pale and sweating, but smiling. The emotion was rare on her face. In fact, Ruby couldn't remember seeing her smile.

Almost as one, they stepped closer to the entrance. A shaft with no lights. Pieces of a ladder clung to one side, taunting anyone that tried to descend without preparation.

"In we go?" asked Jaune.

"I'll lead." Qrow leapt in.

In a moment he was beyond view, and ten seconds later, everyone's scrolls vibrated with ʙᴏᴛᴛᴏᴍ sᴀғᴇ, ғᴏʟʟᴏᴡ. Ruby came next, firing down to slow her descent. Then Ren, jumping from wall to wall, and finally Nubu with Jaune in her arms, using her semblance against the metal walls and floor.

The shaft bottomed out in a square room the same size, and the ladder at the bottom was intact, just to rub it in. There was a doorway with a missing door into a room lined with lockers, most of which were missing their fronts or at least dented. Everything was metal, and all of it scuffed and dark in the dim light. Ruby didn't see any furniture.

Ruby turned her scroll's torch mode on and stuck it on the front of her belt. Soon the group had decent visibility between them.

"Ground rules. Scrolls on silent, keep them in wave mode. Stay close to each other. We regroup and leave in an hour, no matter what we're in the middle of." Qrow turned to survey the group, and Ruby held her hand up to shield her eyes from his scroll's torch beam. "And do anything I say without question."

"What if you tell us to stay for more than an hour, Mr. Branwen?" asked Nubu, her skin sallow in the light.

"Then what you're hearing speak isn't me," the man answered. "Any other questions? No? Then let's move."


	13. Slipping

Neo flicked the monitor through the cameras watching Diamond's Edge and its neighbor forts. They were terrible quality, their small form factor being so important. It wouldn't help anybody for the army to catch wind of the white fang surveilling them. Well, it would help Cinder.

She reached the feeds from the cameras placed around Diamond Inn, the wayhouse on the other side of the ridge. These were also grainy because, although Neo's outpost was in an abandoned farmhouse close to the ridge, the signal had to be bounced through a signal tower behind her, closer to the city proper.

She saw nothing. Odds were feeds wouldn't help anyway. The call to action would probably come one of two ways: Either in a very obvious wave of grimm and death cresting the hill, or in a call from the man Shell had placed as an informant in the wayhouse over the ridge. His call would get them... maybe three or four minutes of advanced warning before the aforementioned wave.

But still, there was nothing _else_ here to do. Alba's elite white fang force stationed with Neo weren't great for conversation, and she was too antsy to read her current book: _Collapse: The Rise and Fall of Mantle._ It just seemed to on the nose. Although not as bad as her current level in Grim Defense. _Mistral Massacre_. What did that leave? Thinking?

Neo rose and did a kata, careful not to damage the room. Old farmhouses were rather delicate. When she started to sweat, she sat back down. Nothing on Diamond Inn West. Neo pressed the button to change view to Diamond Inn North. It was a bright, cloudless day, perfect for visibility.

There was a rumbling in the distance. Widening her eyes, Neo flicked through the rest of the views. Nothing looked wrong. Neo got up, opened the door and walked out onto the farmhouse porch.

The city, down in the gorge, wasn't burning. But something past it was. Columns of smoke rose from from past the city.

 _The border forts_. Neo was in the exact wrong spot.

sᴇ ᴀᴛᴛᴀᴄᴋ ɴᴏᴡ, sent Neo. They'd been had. The attack came from the opposite of the place the general had moved the troops from. Either Cinder had known Neo was listening and put on the whole play to fool her...

...Or she'd just been trying to fool the general. For how few people should be in Fort Diamond's Edge right now, there was a lot of hardware. Hardware that's hard to move.

ᴏᴍᴡ ʙᴇ ʀᴇᴀᴅʏ, Blake sent back. Neo walked upstairs, where the door to Alba's team's room stood closed. She slammed a fist through it, broke it in two, then held her scroll up with the message ᴅᴏᴡɴsᴛᴀɪʀs ɴᴏᴡ ᴡᴇ'ʀᴇ ʟᴇᴀᴠɪɴɢ. One learned to get creative with sound when mute.

The group gathered their weapons and made it to the porch in time for a bullhead to crash-land on the front lawn. "Get in!" shouted Blake from inside. Neo and the team jumped on and the white fang leader took off again, flying towards the city. The house car apparently wasn't fast enough.

"The attack has no humans," Blake explained as she flew. "Grimm I haven't seen before. Shell is leading the first line of defense. I don't suppose you'd like a promotion."

Neo glanced at the others. The other white fang seemed unamused with their leader joking about her second-in-command's death, but they weren't about to raise a fuss now. Everyone could see there was work to do, and this group had been selected as loyal.

Besides, if they left now, there wouldn't be anything to go back to.

They made good time over the city. Blake was on the phone with some Mistral councilman, telling him not to fire on any faunus. Neo surfed her scroll over to some newscasts, which told her nothing, but Alba's squad behind her huddled close and she felt awkward turning them back off. One clip showed a creep running through a street, a little girl in its mouth. They repeated that footage a lot. It was an odd feeling. Didn't Alba have her own scroll?

In another ten minutes, the battleground was visible. Six forts had exploded somehow, with grimm streaming in over the miles-long gap in the city's defenses. The farmland was teeming with every type of grimm, tens of thousands, for miles inward. There they met the defensive line, with soldiers on either end extending a perimeter down from the closest functional forts, and a smattering of white fang and huntsmen holding in the center. Two things struck Neo.

The first was the wall of green in the center of the defensive line, plants sticking out from the mostly flat farmland. It must have been nearly a mile long. As Neo watched, a goliath charged too close, only to be engulfed by vines wrapping around it and pulling it into a cocoon.

The second was that it wasn't working. The white fang and huntsmen tried to cover the entire attack front, but grimm were slipping through, a lot of them. The soldiers held the sides with a compact formation studded with armor, leaving the less disciplined groups to cover the majority of the ground. There were others soldiers closer to the city, taking potshots at the escaping grimm, but not many.

Blake took the bullhead in for a landing behind the green line, which was a mess of grass, grains, and vines at least ten feet thick. As she dropped below 100 feet, Shell appeared in the window, both eyes blazing with green fire. She was held aloft by her cape of woven vines, which had sprouted and grown, lifting her up. As Blake brought the ship down, the vines supporting the woman shrank with it until her feet touched the ground outside the windshield.

Blake opened the door to her. The woman looked drained. "Is this wall your doing?"

"Yes, Blake." Shell saluted. "I'm past my limits. Please don't ask for more." Did she always know Blake's name? Did it matter any more?

"Shell, I could kiss you. And I just secured qualified amnesty for all white fang that fight with me, so I guess you win _that_ bet. Can you move your wall a third of a mile north?"

"It might be painful." Shell looked up as a nevermore swooped in at the bullhead. Vines from the wall reached out and pulled the creature to the ground, where Alba beheaded it with her claymore. Some white fang were less useless than others.

Especially Shell. What were those green eyes? What _was_ she?

"Then don't bother," Blake told her. "Lita, you're with me. We're leaking grimm in the north. Alba! Take your team south of the green, and pull the line there back. They need to move to level ground. And remember, this isn't a sprint."

Blake started walking. Neo fell in behind. "This will be a marathon."


	14. Sink or Swim

Sleeping was a mistake. One of many. Walking north until her ice started free floating, then continuing to walk, that was another one.

Ice didn't hold its form when Yang slept, and she didn't much feel like drowning in the middle of the ocean in the middle of the night, so she made a sphere. As large as she could. She kept ten feet in the center hollowed out, with a flat floor, and when she lay down she could feel it melting. It wouldn't keep its form long enough for her to sleep.

So Yang pressed as hard as she could, and the ice crunched and compacted. And she put more ice around that, and compacted that too. And when she'd made the ice as large and as dense as she could, she decided that it wouldn't melt through in a night. Sleep was the latest in a series of mistakes making up Yang's last three months of life, although hardly worse than stranding herself at sea in the first place. Or inviting Pilo into her house. Or listening to her.

 _Or trying to save Blake,_ said Yang's dreams.

Yang awoke to near-total blackness. She placed her stump on her icy floor, connecting her mind and aura to her craft. She couldn't manipulate it like an arm, but she could gauge its dimensions. It was thirty feet wide, with ten foot thick walls around her ten foot room, and touching water on every surface. It felt heavy. Pressed in.

_Ice can sink?_

The only light was a faint redness glowing through one edge of her sphere. Her _submarine_. At first it was constant, then it blinked off for a second. Thirty more seconds of glow, and another short blink. It seemed to be nearing her. Or she was nearing it. It was enormous, fifty or sixty feet wide. At its edges, through ten feet of compacted ice, Yang could make up a darker red surface. Maybe just red from reflected light. Maybe white in normal light. Bone white.

As it blinked again, Yang realized that it was _actually_ blinking because it was _actually_ an eye. The eye of a grimm big enough to have eyes larger than goliaths.

 _Up I go._ If ice got her into this mess it could get her back out. She melted the outermost edges of her sphere. One foot gone. Three feet. She felt, more than heard, a crack. Yang knew enough about the ocean to know about water pressure.

"Never mind!" Yang would have time later to decide where this landed on her scale of deadly mistakes, unless it turned out to actually be deadly. Instead of getting rid of heavy ice, she could add light ice. She froze water where the old ice had been, not compacting it this time. Then she kept on freezing. The more she could cake onto the craft, she faster she would rise away from the grimm she'd accidentally started a staring contest with. She was already rising. Yang froze more on, and more. Fifty feet around. Sixty.

She shot up into blackness, and let herself exhale. She'd be safely stranded at the surface in a minute or three. Then Yang could figure out a way to land. At least she wasn't in danger of dehydration. She willed a few cubes of ice from the wall, distilled them and had a drink. The salt dust fell at her feet.

And then light. Yang hit the surface. It was morning already, and the weather was calm.

And she saw debris. In her haste to graft ice to the side of her sphere, Yang had accidentally frozen something in. She placed her stump on the wall and unfroze the sphere from the outside, letting cold water slosh off of her craft. Finally, she saw the object frozen in was a body. Sitting cross-legged, with dead skin. She kept melting until all she had was a platform on the water, thick enough to not tip over. The body, suspended in ice above, fell to the ice beside her.

And it uncrossed its legs and stood up. Yang shouted and fell down. Was it — was she — not dead?

"Greetings," the woman spoke. She wasn't a corpse, just pale. She was Yang's height, with long, straight white hair, and could apparently meditate at the bottom of the ocean or encased in ice. She wore a white kimono, which like her skin was clean and flawless. "Who, pray tell, has sent you?"

"Huh?" asked Yang. The tides and ocean currents had sent her. She hadn't been looking for...

"Was it a tall man with brown eyes and gray hair wearing foolish glasses, or a distracted young woman who heard voices?"

It didn't seem like a time to start lying. "I met a woman named Pilo something. She told me to go north from my home in Patch." Somehow that didn't seem complete. "Patch is to the south."

The white woman closed her eyes, took a breath, and opened them again. "She did not tell you why you were to summon me."

"No." Yang reconstituted her her ice arm and climbed to her feet. "I don't know who you are or if I was supposed to meet you. I can't control where I move out here."

The woman looked around and her eyes widened. Like she'd just realized she was standing on a block of ice in the middle of the ocean. Like that hadn't been obvious.

"You are stranded."

She didn't say _we._ Yang watched her, hoping.

The water around Yang's iceberg stilled. It was still water, not ice, it just stopped moving mid-wave. The waves rocking the ice back and forth stopped. The wind quieted as well, leaving the pair in silence.

The woman closed her eyes, took a breath, and opened them. "I will walk you to shore. I am Tahki." She strode southeast, to the right of the sunrise, walking straight off of the ice and on top of the still water. Yang followed. She could always freeze the water if it became water again.

Yang had been through enough in the past week that this was hardly a tipping point. Sure, just follow the deep sea underwater sleeper across the surface of the sea, what could possibly go wrong? Looking carefully, she saw that water started moving about a hundred feet away. The range of Tahki's power wasn't even twice as long as Yang's. But she could keep things positioned absolutely, so they wouldn't be carried on the tides.

After a few minutes of walking, Tahki spoke. "Tell me everything of your meeting with Pilo."

Yang gave her a summary of a strange woman asking to be invited in, attacking her unprovoked with blazing yellow eyes, and taking her fire away. She slipped in her name a few times near the beginning, since Tahki had forgotten to ask.

Tahki listened and remained silent some time after Yang's story sputtered out.

"So," Yang tried. "What were you doing at the bottom of the ocean?"

Tahki closed her eyes, took a slow breath and opened them, which was quite impressive since she kept walking on uneven water the entire time. It was slippery, but not quite as slippery as Yang thought it should be. "I have been stilling the grimm leviathan."

"Is that something that... needs doing?"

"If the maiden of summer has sent you to me, it means I can be spared hence. She does nothing of consequence without cause and safeguard."

Yang shook her head. Tahki was in front of her, but somehow, it felt like she would know. "If you mean Pilo, I don't think that woman does anything with cause and safeguard."

"The maiden of summer is unique. Only one power of summer yokes the bearer. The other is held by a trust of souls, and it is within their rede that my confidence is placed."

Yang had no idea what Tahki's words meant, but she was the one who lived underwater, so Yang just kept following.

"How many years have befallen since the Vytal truce?" asked Tahki.

"Uh..." Suddenly, history lessons. Hopefully _this_ wasn't what Yang had been meant to learn. "Seventy nine years ago?"

"My time on the surface resonates still. And I have not been gone for so long as for the legends of maidens to have vanished from the world." Yang had a lot of recent experience with not knowing what people were talking about, but was Tahki saying she was at Vytal during the truce? She didn't look a day over thirty. It _would_ explain some of her language. And the legend of the maidens, that Yang had heard... "There are four mantles that pass through mortal hands. Mine, the mantle of winter, is least mercurial. It grants me soundness of mind, that I may devote myself amain to thankless tasks.

"The mantle of summer is the opposite. The trust of souls invariably drives the maiden to wood and ruin. I have never met the same summer maiden twice."

Yang was beginning to understand, and she didn't like it. "So Pilo is the summer maiden and she went nuts and told me to come to you, even though our meeting was a freak chance?"

"No," corrected the woman. The maiden. "Summer told you to come to me. Had the request been the maiden's own, you never would have succeeded." Tahki turned to Yang and smiled. She did seem to be talking more freely. Hadn't done the close her eyes and breathe thing for a bit.

Yang's stomach growled. She was starving. "Any idea how long until we reach the shore?"

Tahki looked at the horizon. "My proficiency lies in serenity, not expedition. You should eat."

Yang opened her pack for more of Pilo's food. "Do you want any?"

Tahki shook her head. "I have suspended my body in order to better effectuate my duties."

"So does that mean no drink too?"

Yang ate by herself, sitting cross-legged under the crest of a motionless wave, while Tahki told her about maidenhood, and grimm, and things she knew. Things that might be the reason she was awakened. She had so much to tell that she kept on speaking as they walked, until the sun was overhead and land was in sight.

"My duty does not compel me thereinto." There were buildings on the shore. They'd reached northwestern Vale. "Your semblance is enow to reach land. Although you have added to my incubus, I enjoyed the respite you offered me from my vigil. Fare you well, huntress." Yang's scroll gave a short vibration to indicate it had service, then a longer vibration nagging her to check it.

ɴᴇᴡ ᴍᴇssᴀɢᴇ: sᴄʜɴᴇᴇ, ᴡᴇɪss.

Even with all of Tahki's information, Yang's mind raced. Either someone was playing a mean joke, or Beacon had been retaken and the CCT repaired... or Weiss was in Vale. The message was sent since Yang had last been in service range, two days ago on Patch.

"What _is_ that?" Tahki looked at Yang's scroll, perplexed.

 _She hasn't gotten out much this century._ "Are you _sure_ you don't want to come with me?"


	15. Come Undone

The sun went down, and Neo killed.

Creeps, ursas, whole packs of beowolves. Grimm have no souls, no aura. Iris moved through them like blood.

Neo looked up the mountainside as it cloaked itself in night. The packed masses of grimm looked just as large as they'd been when Neo arrived.

Neo blocked a boarbatusk charge, then closed Iris and stabbed it. She'd lost track of Blake over an hour ago. Around her fought scattered pockets of soldiers, huntsmen and even a few tactical police squads. The white fang, if any were still alive, weren't nearby.

Neo was killing on fumes. She still had aura, technically, although she'd lost almost all of it from those grimm with the whips. She was hungry and exhausted. Her movements were slow. Another death stalker would kill her. Hell, another of the whip grimm would kill her.

Neo stepped backwards. Spear an ursa, two more steps. Wound a diving griffin, start to sprint.

There would be evac somewhere. A second defensive line. Medical facilities. A safe zone.

To her surprise, Neo was nearly in the city. The front line had moved back two miles since she'd arrived. In another ten seconds, she left the innermost farmland and entered a residential district full of broken homes. All lights were off, but fire kept the street lit. Residents were dead or gone. She passed a manned artillery gun on a lawn.

The smell of smoke filled Neo's lungs. She wanted to run, but slowed to a walk. She just couldn't. Her legs wouldn't let her. Her mind. No part of her cooperated. From four kingdoms to three. Whatever Cinder wanted, she was going to get it.

Neo dragged her body through the streets. Grimm were rare as she reached an urban neighborhood, and there were now enough people to sustain a low-level panic. They moved this way and that. Nobody paid Neo any mind. She couldn't summon enough effort to want more.

Neo tripped on a curb and her aura broke.

 _I always assumed it would be a hit._ Dying to random grimm was so anticlimactic. Better a tale of intrigue and drama. Nishan's gang had given her a real run of it, two years back. And killed by Cinder had been a real possibility for a while. By Neo's estimation, this didn't count, unless Cinder would do her the favor of appearing before her and finishing things personally.

Neo dragged her body against a building and hugged her legs. People scurried past, in uniforms or without. Well, it was something to do while they waited to die. It's not wasted time if you enjoyed it, right? Neo yawned, and closed her eyes.

Blake said that Ruby left the city.

At least some things could turn out alright. Outer Mistral would have a rough time with the city gone, but they'd make do. Wherever it was that Ruby was going, it would be safer than here. It would have to be. Footsteps walked by.

Qrow, Jaune, Nubu, Ren. _Take good care_. She couldn't even think of a threat. _Care for her._

Neo had never been happy navigating her life. She'd left Roman for the first time at 13, but life only made sense when someone told her where to go. She'd dealt with most crime syndicates in the city - using at least one meaning of the world "dealt." Now Blake's white fang was massacred. And anyone staying in the city would follow. In the past, Neo had been good at helping her leader. The one that made use of her. _Nothing would have helped this._ Maybe if she'd had powers, like Shell.

But Neo didn't. She could glass, and kick, and stab. She was strong, as huntresses went, but hardly exceptional. Which, in this case, meant useless. Oh, she'd hurt some grimm, but what did it matter? Would Blake be happy with her?

Would Ruby?

The footsteps that approached her didn't leave this time.

"Hello, gorgeous."

Neo battled her eyelids open. It may have been an anthropomorphization of the lingering specter of death, but Roman Torchwick stood above her, looking just how he used to. Holding a gloved hand down for her like on that first night. Waiting for her to make the next step. To her surprise, Neo didn't want to die.

So Neo took his hand in her own, pulled herself up, and touched Roman's face. What in her soul did she care stayed private now? _Take me away, Roman. Away from here. Away from this._

Neo got flashes as Roman's semblance understood her. Vulnerability when she met Ruby for the first time. Betrayal, then calm, as Roman shot her hand. And anger. Anger when Ruby wouldn't listen. Anger when the white fang defied her. Anger and hurt as Ruby left. When Neo told the girl she loved her. Love.

"That complicates things," Roman said, summing up her life.

_It will be simpler, now that you're here._

"Don't worry, my little ice cream cone. For you, this will be simple."

Roman kissed her on the forehead, and punched her in the jaw.


	16. Flames

Most of the east wing was smaller than the southern caves. Thinner. No room for nevermores, deathstalkers, or goliaths.

Qrow held Reaper up to guard and severed the head of the leaping cat grimm. A little larger than lions, but with stubbier legs. He hadn't seen them before.

Qrow decided to call them _Branwens._ It was only fair.

"Is that it?" asked Ruby, the bodies of some branwens smoking at her feet. On second thought, naming them branwens might not be a great idea. Qrow made a note to call them _Kasha._ Less personal. Almost as cool.

"That's it. Let's keep up the pace, we're getting close." Qrow hoped. They'd gone as far as he remembered going south on the first trip. Although to be fair, Qrow had a lot to remember from that trip, and measures of distance hadn't been his focus. They were 45 minutes in, but going had been slow.

The east doorway opened up to a natural cavern, with a worked stone floor but rough walls. The ceiling was too high for Qrow's light. Place was bad. Too big. And it seemed empty, which was always a bad sign. Plenty of room for the nasties in here.

Well, unless it _was_ empty. That would be fine. But what were the odds something would be fine now? Nonexistent. "Stay close." There would be a door on the other end. Or a portal. Or something. All the way east, Raven said. Something that explained the fort's destruction. Something the Mistral army dug up.

A way to the city. A way to the source.

They were well into the cavern when a series of squishing sounds accompanied grimm dropping from above, encircling Qrow and the children. These ones were bipedal, almost human shaped, but with long whiplike strands instead of arms. Their flesh, besides the bone masks and plating, was inky black. Blacker than grimm Qrow had seen before.

Anything Qrow said would be redundant. He swung Reaper, and behind him, the rest did what they were trained for.

There were at least six; Qrow didn't count. He charged the nearest. The whips were fast, and the attack profile was hard to dodge. After ducking one and sidestepping another, Qrow cut the tentacle on the third swing, but momentum still smacked it into his chest. He finally got into range and impaled the creature, cutting up to bisect its head. He'd caught the attention of another, so he lifted Reaper and kicked the body of the first one into its tentacle. The creature's other tentacle swept his foot as he charged, so Qrow aerial cartwheeled, firing a shot when he swung upside down. Landing upright, he stumbled as his leg gave out, but still managed to cut the grimm in two.

Qrow righted to see the children still fighting. He shot the creature constricting Jaune. He still had aura, but his foot was unsteady where the grimm had lashed it. He didn't feel any damage from the first hit.

Ren sliced through the creature's tentacles and kicked it back. Another one whipped Ruby in the back, flooring her.

"Qrow Branwen, look around and want to _stay_."

A voice he'd heard but once before. On the loudspeakers throughout the academy, throughout the city, and throughout the world, the night beacon fell. He'd learned her identity later, from Glynda.

Cinder Fall, maiden of autumn. Possessor of Inner Storm. Qrow's feet were stuck. They weighed a million pounds.

If Cinder was here, they were close.

If Cinder was here, they were all about to die.

It was now or never for Ruby's Argent awakening. Qrow kept firing at the remaining grimm. The room got brighter as a ball of fire appeared above them. Cinder, descending.

Finally, Ruby diced the last grimm. Qrow fired Reaper at the maiden. As one, the children did what they could to her as well. What they could do, it turned out, was nothing.

Cinder's ring of fire winked out as she approached the floor, out, her eyes remaining lit. She landed in the middle of the group, facing Qrow. "I'm told you've been quite the thorn in our sides."

Ren jumped towards her, striking her back with his palm. A burst of fire knocked him back thirty feet. She didn't turn around. Nubu swung her staff against the woman's back, then backed up and popped her spear point out. Cinder finally turned around to respond, but Nubu stayed light on her feet, staying just out of range and dodging the maiden's attacks while giving Jaune and Ruby openings. Qrow kept firing, careful not to hit Nubu if Cinder dodged.

But Cinder wasn't content to stand there defending. She fired jets of flame from her palms to corral the students, then rose into the air beyond their range. Ruby started firing at her, while Jaune blocked Cinder's fire with his shield. Nubu, realizing the futility of flying up and meeting her, retreated to where Ren was recovering and spun her staff to redirect the flames.

Ruby's eyes remained steadfastly normal, so Qrow had a choice.

The last time Ruby's eyes awakened, it had been from seeing the death of a friend. From being too late to help. Dare Qrow have her stay until the end of this fight?

What would stop Cinder from killing her first?

"Get to the surface, now!" he shouted over the sound of his own gunfire.

"But..." began Jaune.

If Ruby's eyes awakened now, nothing Qrow said would stop her. But if they waited five minutes for it, it would be too late. For all of them.

Qrow must have been going soft. He let the girl get to him. "No questions!"

Jaune grabbed Ruby by the arm and started running for the door. Nubu waited for Ren to join them, then backed up, still spinning her staff.

Cinder flew past them to the wall above the door, then started her descent. She would trap them in, and kill all five at her leisure.

So Qrow transformed Reaper into scythe form and lobbed it towards her. It spun through the air and the blade embedded itself in the rock behind Cinder, the handle pinning her to the wall.

She broke free in a second, after the others were through the door. Their footsteps faded.

Cinder floated over to him, holding Reaper. "Now, why would you go and do that?"

Qrow chuckled. "Oh, I like playing hard to get."

"But I've already got you, Qrow." _And because she chose me, the others will get away. You had the argent right in front of you and you wasted Inner Storm._

_How arrogant._

"Gimme my scythe and let's make it a fight."

Cinder's turn to laugh. "I don't think you understand, Qrow. I'm going to ask you questions. You're going to answer them. And after I know everything I need to know, I will take care of your girl." She shoved him in the side. "Understand?"

The push was too much for his ankle, and Qrow toppled over. So he opened his mouth and stuck out his tongue.

Afterwards, he smiled and spit on her foot. Let cinder question him _now_.

She sighed and leaned down to him. "Qrow, you're a very stubborn man. What ever will I do with you? I want to keep you here, and all you can think to do is leave." Her eyes hardened.

"Qrow Branwen. Look, and see what you want to do."

"Be a bird, and fly away."

ᴇɴᴅ


End file.
